For many fishing situations, one or more sinkers are employed to maintain a lure or bait in close proximity to the bottom of a body of water. These sinkers are prone to snagging on weeds, rocks, submerged branches, and similar obstacles as the fishing line to which they are connected is moved through the water, especially when trolling. Such snagging may result in breakage of the fishing line and loss of the sinker(s) and possibly the lure or bait attached thereto.
To prevent snagging of the lure or bait, U.S. Pat. No. 5,555,668 of the present inventor teaches a bait locating device that employs a flotation member to float a fishing line and the lure or bait attached thereto off the bottom, allowing the lure or bait to pass over most obstructions. The bait locating device of the '668 patent also prevents loss of the lure or bait in the event that the sinker becomes snagged, since the sinker is attached via a sinker line selected to be weaker than the fishing line, so that the sinker line can be broken to allow recovery of the fishing line and any expensive lure attached thereto when the sinker becomes snagged.
Other patents which teach sinkers that can break away to allow recovery of the lure or bait are taught in U.S. Publication 2004/0134119, which teaches a weight attached to the line by a wire which bends to allow the line to break away, while U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,648,398 and 5,461,821 teach sinkers that have a weight held in a resilient tube, where the weight is intended to be squeezed out of the tube if it becomes trapped. While these patents may allow recovery of the lure or bait and ready replacement of a sinker weight which becomes snagged, they will still result in loss of the weights when used in areas with a large number of obstructions.
To avoid the problem of snagging of the sinker itself, sinkers have traditionally been formed as metal weights having streamlined shapes in an attempt to reduce sharp edges liable to catch on obstructions. However, such sinkers can still become lodged between rocks or fall into crevices and become snagged. Another sinker which has been found liable to snagging in rocks is a “snake sinker”, which is formed from a length of flexible braided fabric tube with a number of ball bearings inserted into the tube and the ends closed to form a flexible, elongated weight. In one embodiment, the tubing is closed at each end by crimping a metal cap onto the fabric tube, the cap also serving to attach a swivel eye for connecting the “snake sinker” to the line. The fabric tube of these sinkers has been found susceptible to wear when the sinkers are used in rocky areas. In addition to their tendancy to snag and suffer damage due to abrasion when used in rocky locations, the “snake sinkers” are relatively expensive, particularly in situations where a greater weight is desired and multiple “snake sinkers” must be connected together to obtain the desired weight.
One approach to reducing snagging is to provide an elongated sinker with a buoyant portion which is intended to cause the sinker to assume an upright position in the water, such as taught in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,670,447 and 3,672,088. These patents teach that the upright position should allow the sinker to pass over obstructions without snagging and to lift out of crevices when retrieved. The incorporation of a buoyant portion will tend to reduce the overall effectiveness of the sinker. Additionally, these elongated sinkers would not appear to have sufficient buoyancy to maintain their upright position when being retrieved through the water, which may limit their practical applications. Although the '447 patent states that the upright position allows the sinker to be pulled out of crevices, the same inventor later found it advantageous to provide the basic structure with an array of wire legs to prevent the resulting sinker from falling into crevices and becoming snagged or jammed therein, as taught in U.S. Pat. No. 4,693,030. While the wire legs of the '030 patent may provide a benefit in rocky environments, they would appear to increase the risk of snagging when employed in areas with weeds and/or branches, and may increase the risk of entanglement with the lure or bait when casting. The resulting sinker also does not appear to be capable of being stored compactly.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,145,240; 6,305,121; 6,557,294; 6,843,018; and 6,874,272, teach elongated sinkers which again have a buoyant portion, but which also have a curved body rather than the straight bodies of the partially buoyant sinkers discussed above. The combination of the buoyant portion and the curved body is intended to allow the sinker to slide over and/or maneuver its way past obstructions rather than snagging. Again, the reduction in overall effective weight due to the buoyant portion may limit the useful applications of the sinker. The limitations of these sinkers are discussed in the Background section of U.S. Publication 2003/0159332, which teaches an elongated sinker having a bent body without any buoyant portion. The bent portion of this sinker is intended to cause the sinker to provide a twisting motion upon contact with obstacles to prevent snagging. However, the weight may still be prone to snagging in situations where there is insufficient space to accommodate the twisting motion, and may be prone to entanglement in weeds. U.S. Pat. No. 5,450,689 teaches another sinker without a buoyant portion, this one having a curved body.
Another approach that has been tried is to form the sinker with at least a portion which is resiliently flexible, as taught in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,727,332 and 4,679,349. These patents teach that having such a resilient portion allows the user to forcefully flex the sinker by jerking the sinker line when the sinker becomes snagged, this action causing the sinker to spring free of the obstacle. This flexing action requires attaching the line in such a manner as to slidably engage the leading end of the sinker and tying to the trailing end, complicating the attachment of the sinker and possibly increasing the risk of snagging or engtangling the sinker line. This action may increase the susceptibility of the line to chafing. While the flexing action of these sinkers may be beneficial in the event that the sinker becomes lodged between rocks or submerged branches, it would not appear to provide any benefit to reduce the possibility of entanglement in weeds or other obstructions which are not rigid, and which can move to accommodate the flexing action of the sinker.
Because the sinkers discussed above rely on the configuration of the sinker for reducing the tendency to snag, they may limit the ability of the user to change the weight of the sinker to suit conditions such as current, boat speed when trolling, etc. To change the sinker weight, the sinker on the line must be replaced with one of a different weight, which requires an inventory of sinkers of different weights. When sinkers having a complex configuration are employed, the high cost of each individual sinker may limit the inventory that the user can afford. The problem of limited weight selection may be a particular problem for those sinkers which employ a buoyant portion, since they are complicated in structure and the effective weight of the resulting sinker is reduced by the buoyant portion.
The '398 and '821 patents discussed above do allow the weight of the sinker to be readily changed, by pulling the weight from the tubing and substituting a different weight. However, these devices appear to be limited in the amount of weight that can be employed in the sinker, since a relatively large weight would require the weight to be excessively long, and this long, rigid weight may be more prone to snagging. Also, an excessively long weight is difficult to store conveniently. It also appears that there may be problems attaining the right degree of friction between the weight and the tubing such that the weight will not fall out of the tubing when casting, but will slip out of the tubing if it becomes jammed.
None of the above sinkers appear to provide both resistance to becoming jammed in rocks, crevices, and branches and resistance to becoming entangled in weeds. This limited utility is a particular disadvantage when trolling, since the sinker line may be moved through regions of water having different conditions, such as from a rocky area into an area with numerous weeds.